The federal Superfund statute allows a private person to recover “necessary costs of response incurred” by that person consistently with the governing regulation, the national contingency plan. A recent appellate decision, to be sure unreported and therefore not binding, raises the interesting question of what a person must do to “incur” a cost. The person in question was a law firm and this is an “environmental law practice” column, so the question may be doubly interesting.

Continue reading the full article, published by The Legal Intelligencer Sept. 19, 2024. Reprinted with permission.